The camera was on loan from Abt Appliances, a perk thanks to my position at WTTW-TV, Chicago’s PBS station, as host and producer of the quirky hit show, Wild Chicago. I was going on vacation, but with an eye on shooting exploratory video for a possible new show I’d call Cheap Travels. (Did not happen, though I did get to produce a pilot later that year. A story for another time. Lots of video to show there too!)
A little backstory. This time of the year, winter, was when I finished editing the episodes we’d shot in the previous summer and fall. The 13 shows for the season were “put to bed” at this point on the calendar. WTTW would run the first 13, then repeat them once, maybe twice, up until October, when new shows needed to be ready.
So, come January or February, I was itching to go on an adventure. And I absolutely loved England and particularly London, having enjoyed a semester abroad there in 1975. I didn’t care that it was winter. I’d be free to do as I please, that was the main thing. Oh, and I was less than 2 years clear of the end of my first marriage. Life was very good in these days of Wild Chicago.
I felt unfettered and alive…
This is a story of listening to my own gut and daring to follow it. Something within me said, yes, go ahead to England. Even with all the hand-wringing over the (relatively new) Gulf Crisis, go ahead. You’ll be alright. Ditto with visiting Hadrian’s Wall amidst a big winter storm. The media loves this stuff and likes to stir up fear. Fear draws more eyeballs and raises advertising rates. I’m so glad I didn’t listen.
You know, I think living in Chicago and dealing with our winters over the many years, contributed to my brushing the fear-mongering aside. Extreme weather events in Chicago have historically triggered a desire in me to go out into the elements, be a part of it all. Back on Sunday January 20th, 1985, Chicago hit an all-time cold temperature (-27F) and I couldn’t wait to bundle up and get out there. I walked 3 miles that day through Lincoln Park.
The reward of taking this journey to Hadrian’s Wall (and Vindolanda) at the time I did was, as I remark in the video, this: I had the place to myself. But I wasn’t alone. Visiting unpopulated historical sites always puts me in a reverential mood. It’s a feeling of connectedness with the past and its inhabitants. It’s in these times when my mind presents potent musings like, These people were just like me. They laughed, they cried. They thought they were too fat. They didn’t like people telling them what to do.
And yet, we lived hundreds of years apart, these Roman invaders, far from home. We spoke different languages. But I’m sure we felt the same things. Pain, love, longing, hunger, cold. And now they’re gone. And I’m here. I say they are alive today too. In me.
I could say the same of the guy on the screen. Here he is, more than 30 years ago, age 36. I get to visit this historical record of visiting this historical place via the weird alchemy of videotape. Every time I see these images and hear the sounds, I can’t help feeling I’m playing with something beyond my understanding.
So, for the time being, I set the deep thoughts aside and start poking at the keyboard. I tell a story.
Trusting Your Gut - and Its Rewards